A Raucous Scene for Alternative Rock

By NANCY HARRISON

Published: April 26, 1992

AT a club named Siberia in Levittown, the disk jockey plays music by obscure bands like Skinny Puppy and Mr. Bungle. Dancers are decked out in motorcycle jackets, combat boots and asymmetrical haircuts. Just about the last place you would expect to find an alternative-music club like Siberia is in a shopping center on Hempstead Turnpike.

Combining rock, punk, heavy metal, dance, pop and rap, alternative music defies convention. Considered too experimental for top-40 radio, the music thrives on the airwaves of college radio stations and some commercial outlets, including WDRE-FM in Westbury.

For the most part alternative rock lives in college dormitories and in progressive clubs in cities like New York and Seattle. But it has also found an audience on Long Island, where an increasing number of clubs have gone "underground."

"Young people on Long Island are bored, and they want something different," said the disk jockey at Siberia, Eddie Lentini.

Open since November, Siberia joins a list of new music clubs on the Island. They include Voodoo in Deer Park, Malibu in Lido Beach, Industry in Island Park, Spize in Farmingdale and Ugo's in Locust Valley.

Siberia is open on Friday nights. The rest of the week the club is known as Spit and features the more widely popular mainstream music. Moshing and Swimming

"New York City definitely had a strong influence in creating the scene here," the program director of WDRE, Tom Calderone, said, adding that Long Islanders liked what they saw in the downtown club scene in New York City and brought it home.

But what is accepted in Manhattan can be controversial on Long Island. Although a violent dance known as moshing goes unnoticed in city clubs, it has gained wide attention at Siberia. Young people thrash about the dance floor, purposely bumping into one another. Occasionally someone is lifted and passed from person to person, which is known as swimming.

Christian Meserino, 18, of Westbury, who has been moshing for three years, said: "I know people who have broken arms or legs, but it is not dangerous. If someone falls down, you help pick them up."

Alternative music, said Steve Kass, 23, of Brooklyn,is the anthem of a generation that is disillusioned with society. Mr. Kass is a disk jockey at WDRE and is also the announcer at Siberia.

The message is at times political, at times social, and always anti-establishment, he said. The statement is made not only through the music, but also the fashion. Black is the color of choice, he said, and the more outrageous the outfit, the better.

Donna Valenzano, 23, of Queens, a regular at Siberia, wears a black skintight jump suit and black leather jacket. "We are saying be who you want to be," she said. "You don't have to conform if you do not want to."

"We are worried about the environment," Mr. Kass said. "We are worried about AIDS. We are worried about war." 'We Are Not Going to Sell Out'

He drew a parallel between the 1960's and the 1990's countercultures. "We have similar ideals," he added. "But they let them go when they hit 30. We learned from their mistakes. We are not going to sell out."

Steve Katsur, 19, of Westbury, noted another difference. He glanced at the dance floor and said, "Most of us here do not do drugs."

On a recent Saturday night at Spize, the dancing was more mainstream, but the music was not. Situated across Route 110 from Republic Airport, Spize says it was the first alternative club on the Island.

When it opened 10 years ago, Spize offered live national acts including R.E.M. Now the club features a disk jockey who books local acts about 20 times a year. "It just got to be too expensive," the owner, Raymond Monahan, said.

Jay Jahrsdoerfer, an artist from Port Jefferson, sat at the bar. At the age of 38, he estimates that he is one of the oldest customers in the club. Mr. Jahrsdoerfer wore a black sleeveless T-shirt and black jeans under his shoulder-length hair. "I've been listening to alternative music for 10 years," he said. "It's guttural. It's dark. For me it speaks to this basic restlessness that I have."

The DJ plays Ministry and New Order, bands that have national followings. Lynda Page, 21, of Bethpage, shakes her head in disgust. "How alternative can you get?" Wearing her hair cropped short and in a skintight black miniskirt, she commented: "Everything has been done, from Satan to death. There is no such thing as alternative anymore." Industrial and Other Divisions

Alternative music evolved out of the punk movement of the late 70's, said Robert Haber, who owns The College Music Journal, known as C.M.J., in Great Neck. The company publishes The New Music Report, a weekly newsletter that reports on alternative bands and tracks trends at college stations.

Mr. Haber said alternative music was divided into industrial, a derivative dance music; punk funk, a combination of heavy metal and punk; hard core, a variation of hard rock, and ska, a version of reggae.

In 1982, WDRE, known then as WLIR, switched from playing progressive music to alternative rock. Denis McNamara, who was the program manager, engineered the change.

"We had done a survey and found that there was a segment of the market that was not being served," Mr. McNamara said. "We decided to take a chance and play bands that did not get air play."